Providence beats UMass on late goal

AMHERST - They won most of the races for the puck, and a good number of the battles on the boards, but some sloppy defensive play made the difference on the scoreboard as the University of Massachusetts hockey team fell 5-4 to the new and improved Providence Friars.

For the second straight week, the Minutemen appeared to have forced overtime with a late goal, coming back from a 4-2 deficit to tie the game with 2:35 left on Martin Nolet's shot from the left faceoff circle.

But in the final minute, UMass center Casey Wellman lost a faceoff to PC's Kyle MacKinnon, who sent the puck back to the right point to Matt Taormina for the winning shot.

The Minutemen outshot the Friars 46-31, but saw their record drop to 9-10-2, and 4-6-2 in Hockey East.

"We left it on the ice, we did everything but win that game, and that's a sad commentary quite frankly," UMass coach Toot Cahoon said.

UMass goalie Dan Meyers gave up a soft goal on a flip to the far corner that gave Providence a 2-1 lead 54 seconds into the second period. Another defensive breakdown occurred on a centering pass 22 seconds later for the third PC goal.

In the first period, Providence's Matt Germain caught the Minutemen napping for a breakaway goal. And the fourth Friar goal, by Andy Baylysky, came after a UMass turnover in front of the net with seven minutes remaining in the second period.

UMass had outscored Providence 14-5 in the first two games of the season series, and had hoped to make the finale a season sweep. But Providence (6-12-1, 3-8-1), once 0-8-1 in league play, has won their last three Hockey East games since the arrival of Alexander the Great.

Freshman goaltender Alex Beaudry joined the Friars from Cumberland, Ontario, at the semester break, and has won all three of his starts.

Providence will lose senior goaltender Chris Mannix after this season, and their No. 1 starter, junior Ryan Simpson, is injured. So PC coach Tim Army decided to seek midseason help after Mannix and freshman Justin Gates sported only an 85 percent save percentage in the first half of the year.

UMass will try and regroup Saturday night at UMass-Lowell.

"Now the challenge for us is to be able to absorb this blow like we absorbed the New Hampshire blow here last year, and be able to come off it, and make something positive happen," Cahoon said.

Michael Lecomte gave the Minutemen a 1-0 lead while Wellman and Justin Braun had the other scores.